Lokpal Bill: Congress up, Anna down, BJP lonely, Lalu & Co. wary

The good news is that our parliamentarians are working on holidays to make up for the lost time they spent hollering at each other. Or at least they appear to be working, and have extended the winter session into the Christmas-New Year recess to discuss the revised Lokpal Bill.

But the big question about this great Indian political circus is: will the Lokpal Bill go the women’s bill way?
In the case of the women’s quota bill, only the majority of our politicians were opposed to it; in this case, even the bureaucracy doesn’t look pleased with its proposals.

Now with each political party in the country attempting to tweak the Lokpal Bill to suit their political convenience, Team Anna seems to be caught in a strange situation in which their existence depends solely on 24X7 TV coverage. While Anna and his strategists can take heart that it was they who campaigned successfully for the introduction of the Lokpal Bill in Parliament, they have, in more ways than one, been politically outwitted recently.

One Up Congress

The Congress, which has over the past few years hurtled from one graft crisis to another and has cringed in the face of anti-corruption protests led by Anna Hazare, seems to have regained political ground following the tabling of the revised draft. Though it might appear that it has been battered in Parliament by the Opposition and that there are murmurs of disapproval within, it has succeeded over the past few weeks in warding off a few of its troubles.

One, it has tarnished the incorruptible image of most of Anna’s lieutenants; two, it has divided the opposition, and three, it has brought in a revised bill and linked its rollout to the passage of a constituent amendment bill — which has to be backed by at least two-thirds of members in both Houses of Parliament.

“Perhaps for the first time the government may be glad not to have a two-third majority in the Lok Sabha and a simple majority in the Rajya Sabha. If it fails, it can blame the opposition and distract popular distrust and drag the bill on,” says a political analyst who didn’t wish to be identified.

While political pundits are anxious that the ruling party is using such a crucial bill to score a brownie point or two in upcoming state elections, a section in the Congress thinks the party is able to pass a message to Muslims of poll-bound Uttar Pradesh who had distanced from it since the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992. In the Bill, the Congress-led UPA has recommended quota for Muslims in the proposed nine-member Lokpal.

Troubles for Team Anna

The debate getting dragged on won’t be good for Anna & Co. Analysts say the much-celebrated anti-corruption movement’s appeal hasn’t gone beyond middle classes, and unlike the JP movement of the 1970s, is playing on the fringes of the Indian society.

Therefore, stakes are so high in this game for Anna that he can’t afford the luxury of a failure. “Politicians’ perennial aversion to sharing powers with civil society groups and the likely public dissatisfaction with delays in Anna securing ‘concrete results’ may sound the death knell of his movement if he isn’t able to find like-minded political allies to back him,” the political analyst said.

By all indications, the recent posturing at Jantar Mantar — which saw all opposition parties converging to declare their solidarity with Anna — may be short-lived. For, the main opposition BJP is more interested in political gains. The party may not want anything more than a subtle support in elections from the Anna movement, said an RSS leader who asked not to be named.

Lonely BJP

Incidentally, the BJP, the most vocal supporter of Team Anna, stands isolated in its opposition to “minority reservation” in Lokpal. NDA allies Akali Dal and JD(U) have refused to join the saffron party on this issue. The role of the Left parties—whose presence was conspicuous at the Jantar Mantar meeting — is largely that of an onlooker with Lokpal or Lokayukta (state-level bodies similar to the Lokpal) being a non-issue in their catchment areas—where the Anna movement hasn’t found much resonance so far. The reason being the political classes in states such as Kerala and West Bengal aren’t perceived as absolutely corrupt, unlike in the northern and a few western states.

Wary Regional Parties

For their part, regional satraps such as RJD’s Lalu Prasad, SP’s Mulayam Singh Yadav and the likes of J Jajayalalithaa of the DMK and Mayawati of BSP have reasons to be wary of the prospect of being cornered in various graft cases pending against them.

Increasingly, the Anna movement appears to understand that it can’t take on casteist or regional parties without complicating matters, thanks to its prominent urban and middle class support base. This — the Anna vs regional parties — has now become a particularly politically charged issue given that UP elections are due so soon.

Next week will see both Parliament and Team Anna, in Delhi and Mumbai, respectively, engaged with the Lokpal issue. Things can change. But as of now, it’s not advantage Team Anna.